


all i want to get is a little bit closer (four times skye and coulson went undercover - and one time they didn't)

by zauberer_sirin



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Danger, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Future Fic, Getting Together, Gunshot Wounds, Hugs, Hurt/Comfort, Missions, Motel Rooms, Older Man/Younger Woman, POV Skye, Porn with Feelings, Slow Build, Slow Dancing, Smut, Undercover, Unresolved Sexual Tension, a mere excuse for lots of UST, meaningful haircuts, oblivious fools, sexy fighting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-22
Updated: 2014-04-26
Packaged: 2018-01-20 11:12:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 18,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1508393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zauberer_sirin/pseuds/zauberer_sirin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Skye thinks she might even get the hang of this whole undercover thing if only Coulson would stop being so... distracting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. here comes the rush before we touch (come a little closer)

**Author's Note:**

> For [hamsterfactor](http://hamsterfactor.tumblr.com/) on her birthday. Enjoy the UST.
> 
> Titles from Tegan and Sara's "Closer".

  


  


It's a simple mission to start with, which Skye appreciates, because the only other real time she went undercover, hardcore (not counting that bit with Lloyd Rathman, and not counting the Boiler Room, and also not counting posing as Fitz's girlfriend because at least those times she didn't have to convince _the enemy_ ) Quinn's goons pulled a gun on her and she had to jump into a pool and then they all almost died from Gravitonium so. Better take it easy this time.

It's a simple mission: pharmaceutical company which is not so clean as it seems, HYDRA connections, somebody flips, one of the bad guys flips, somebody gives SHIELD a day and a place to pick up a flash drive, somebody gives them the names of the people they are expecting and Skye's hand at faking credentials does the rest.

It's a two-man mission.

Or rather a man and a woman mission; someone has to be Gloria Adler, from Preka Enterprises, a ghost company for the loyal and the ambitious, HYDRA's footsoldiers in the southwest.

It's a very simple mission, actually: get there, pick up the package, get out. Nobody needs to suspect a thing. Except Skye has been prepping for days. Because yeah, every time Coulson says it's a simple mission something tends to go terribly, terribly wrong.

"Have you practiced saying _Hail HYDRA_?" Coulson asks her the day of the mission.

"Yeah, I practiced all morning. And yet the gag reflex won't go away."

Coulson smiles at her. "It'll be fine."

She has to be there. No one could make the connection between this ghost company and HYDRA. Nobody could make the connection until one day Skye made it, that is. And Coulson actually needs Skye to come with him. It could have been Simmons but she's very bad at this and doesn't have the combat skills Skye already has. It could have been May, it would be safer, actually, except May doesn't look like the employee of a company dedicated to neurological research.

"Also, it's my op," Skye points out when Coulson seems to get a bit twitchy about bringing her along. "I found out about this, I deserve to see it through."

He nods, and Skye knows he wouldn't take this from her. They are a lot less about hierarchy these days in this team and unless someone has a particularly stupid idea everybody pretty much makes their own decisions – it's funny but that doesn't get messy, they are all smart people, they all arrive a pretty much the same conclusions every time.

She's nervous though, hoping that is indeed the right decision. Perhaps she should let Simmons go, she looks much more like a neuroscientist, much more like a _Gloria_ , Skye doesn't look like she even went to college, she's going to give herself away, but then Simmons would be in danger and Skye doesn't want that. Square one. She's nervous. Nervous and afraid and she realizes she is fidgeting. She also realizes Coulson is looking at her with a weird face. He's nothing but weird faces these days. The fact that Skye can distinguish between different tonalities of weird on his expression should worry her, right? Right.

"It'll be okay," Coulson tells her. She's not sure who he is trying to reassure. "I'll be with you the whole time."

He doesn't say _you'll be safe_. He doesn't say _I'll protect you_. He says _I'll be with you_. For some reason Skye thinks that's a lot better.

 

+

 

"So, what do we do?" she asks as they travel there. "Do we come up with a background? Are you my boss in the company, am I the promising scientist with fascist leanings? Better yet, I could be _your boss_ , defy expectations, people suspect a lot less of a story if it's bizarre. I could be the genius wunderkind and you could be my lackey."

Coulson stares at her. Skye would say he looks amused, but that can't possibly be.

"You're chatty on missions?"

"I'm chatty _always_ ," Skye comments because really, he should have picked on that already. "Specially when I'm terrified."

He taps his fingers on her knee, once, twice. Okay, that is strange but it actually calms her down. Trip, at the wheel, says nothing.

 

+

 

"I'll be you at the West entrance," Trip tells them. "Be swift."

She and Coulson walk on, seeing the building appear among a street of similar almost exactly-identical buildings, downtown Phoenix. Nobody would tell this is a HYDRA complex, here in the middle of the city, so anodine, among the unsuspecting bystanders. It gives Skye the chills, to have something so evil inserted in such an everyday environment. She supposes that's HYDRA through and through. She doesn't want to turn that metaphor too much, already a bitter taste in her mouth.

She deflates it with a joke. "I hope you know where the West entrance is because I have no clue."

From the corner of her eye she sees Coulson throwing her an easy smile.

"I know where it is."

 

+

 

"Keep close to me," Coulson says, one simple single sound under his breath, as she uses their stolen badges to pass security.

"You don't have to _tell me_ ," she replies, soft enough that only he can hear her.

 

+

 

Skye doesn't know why she decides to play it this way but she does. At first she's going to go for the obedient subordinate to Coulson's lead but as they approach the front desk she can tell that's the wrong move here. These people might not be soldiers, agents, but they know enough. Coulson doesn't really sell the game. She's sorry to say but he doesn't. She knows they need to divert the attention from him somehow.

She hands their cards to the man in the desk, taking Coulson's from him. There's a split-of-second moment of surprise in his eyes because they had agreed he'd take the lead in this. He must be wondering why she suddenly went off book. She says their fake names in a friendly tone.

"Which one's the supervisor?" the man inquires.

"That would be me, " Skye answers, leaning on the desk, probably messing her whole pantsuit attire, then gesturing towards Coulson. "Please, does this one have the face of an expert in neuroscience?"

"No?" the man in the desk says, unsure.

Skye smiles.

"I wouldn't think so. This is one of our minions. He doesn't get out too much, look at that pale skin," she tells the man in the desk. The man looks at her like she is unbalanced. Perfect. She puts her arm on Coulson's shoulder, like she's trying to explain his existence away to the guy. "I know the lackey looks shifty and you have your job but I promised him I'd take him for a walk. He's house trained and all, you don't have to worry."

The man in reception doesn't quite know what to do with that. Exactly what Skye was hoping for.

He hands them their IDs and they wait while he makes the visitors' badges. Which he does in record time, like he just wants them gone from around his work station.

Coulson doesn't look impressed at all, more like slightly confused. Maybe even annoyed.

 

+

 

They cross the first set of doors. They close behind them with an audible electronic "clank".

"Was the necessary?" Coulson asks. He looks contraired but not too angry just yet. 

Skye rolls her eyes, not sure why. Here she was this morning trembling at the idea of the mission and now she's all confident and all _I got this_. This is a normal pattern with her, she realizes. She had hoped it was one of the things she left behind when she joined SHIELD.

"Relax. I know about this stuff. The guy is probably thinking _crazy bitch_ but he is not thinking _spy_. Trust me. The trick is not go by unnoticed, the trick is giving the wrong impression."

"I don't know," he mutters, sounding a bit ruffled in his pride. Skye didn't know he cared about that sort of thing.

"Look, I get that I shouldn't have changed the plan, specially without giving you a heads-up, but as soon as I saw the guy I knew we'd get caught otherwise. I can improvise, you know this."

Coulson seems to concede the point, begrudgingly, and Skye guesses it sort of works because they are in the elevator and no one is shooting at them just yet.

They find the room they were looking for, a great light-brown space with high ceiling that looks like a library or an archive.

"We're here for a package," Coulson says, flashing his credentials at the technician on the desk. This time Skye lets him because she has read the man at this desk and this man will sound the alarms at any hint of unorthodox. Skye stays straight and very still, copying Coulson's position, half-hiding behind his body.

The man passes his glance over them for a moment; he doesn't look pleased with them but Skye can tell it's personal rather than that he's suspicious in any capacity.

"Wait here."

He appears three minutes later with a small box.

 

+

 

They aren't found out, but they kind of are.

Skye knew they only had some minutes with those credentials. _Fake_ can only get you so far. The rest is up to you. Skye learned this bit the hard way. 

Through the comms Trip warns them about the security teams sweeping the place. Fortunately the place is huge and they did their homework before coming. Coulson knows every corner and passage and nook. They manage to avoid the security teams as they make their way to the exit, some exit, any kind of exit.

"Here," Coulson says and Skye follows and they turn a corner.

"Here," Coulson says and Skye follows in complete trust.

"Here," Coulson says, gesturing with his hands for her to come but not yaking her arm to make her hurry.

"Here," but then there's a group of three men at the end of the corridor.

They haven't seen Coulson and Skye, not yet, and she can see Coulson recoiling so quick there's no way they have been spotted. This time he does grab Skye's arm and he pulls them both towards the nearest side hallway, hoping the salient of the column will be enough to hide them, and the guards would be lazy or hectic enough not to detour towards this area.

He presses them both against the wall, raising one unnecessary finger to his lips. Yeah, like Skye is going to say something. How much of an amateur does he think she is? Then again maybe it's just a reflex in this kind of situations or maybe it all went to quickly that he imagines she hasn't seen the guards. Skye can feel Coulson's breath on her cheek. She can smell him – he smells of _Coulson_ , she can tell the scent of ironed fabric on his suit, and coffee and maybe a hint of toothpaste and soap. His ribcage straining against her breasts. She imagines he can tell how fast her heart is beating. And why is her heart beating so fast, that's another question. What the hell is wrong with her?

"You okay?" he whispers, mistaking her agitation.

She nods dumbly. She doesn't know why she's so affected by his proximity all of the sudden. It's just Coulson. Except they haven't quite been so close. It must be the mission. The adrenaline. All those guards who, if they catch them, would ruin so many hours of good work.

They stand like that for a more or less a minute, until the noises from the next hallways have died down. It's more or less a minute but Skye doesn't even have time to get used to it, being pressed like this against Coulson's chest, feeling the shape of him, with danger ringing in her ears and something else jumping in her veins. Her hands itch, doesn't know what she's supposed to do with them – this wasn't in her training, what should she do, she wants to grab Coulson's arms right where they meet his shoulders, and she wants to pull not push and _what the fuck, Skye_ she can hear herself thinking, loud so loud.

At some point he decides it must be safe. He pulls away from her to see if there's someone nearby. Skye feels that absence with strange sharpness, she feels cold without the warmth of his body crushing her against the wall. She feels like she misses his even breathing on her temple.

He takes her by the wrist gently, coaxing her to follow him rather than pulling her along.

"Come on, this way."

 

+

 

Hey, Coulson actually knew where the West Entrance was.

"You're two minutes late," Trip tells them.

"Encountered some difficulties," Coulson says distractedly, opening his hand to make sure he is still clutching the box with the usb drive. He turns to Skye: "All right?"

She nods.

Skye feels like every breath she takes is made of lava.

This is not good.

 

+

 

They get out.

They get out, and they get the information out and they are okay, so it doesn't really matter if Skye is a bit spooked or generally confused about a lot of things right now.

She is sitting, cross-legged, on her bed, trying hard not to have a nervous breakdown. She manages pretty well, though, because by the time Coulson swings by she is able to pull a smile that is totally normal and he couldn't even tell the difference. God, she hopes he can't tell the difference.

"How long do you think it'll take them to figure out what we stole?" she asks him, before he can say anything.

"It doesn't matter. They can no longer use that intel. That was the point."

"Mmm," she mutters looking down at her hands. At least, on the outside, she doesn't seem to be trembling or anything, and her heartbeat is back to normal, even with Coulson here. So she concludes it's a mission thing, an undercover thing – she would ask Coulson, if it weren't so embarrassing. He could tell her if this happens a lot to other agents. If this has ever happened to him. No, she can't imagine Coulson ever being this unprofessional. She can't imagine Coulson being affected in this way, period. In or out of a mission.

Skye looks up from her thankfully-non-trembling hands.

He's looking at her with Weird Face #9&1/2.

"You did a good job today, you should be proud," he tells her.

"Thanks but, I know I did nothing. You did all the heavy lifting when things got rough. You were holding this rookie's hand every step of the way."

"That's my job," he says. "Or it is until the day you can hold my hand through it instead."

She snorts. "Yeah, right." 

"Don't laugh," Coulson tells her, obviously amused by it. "That day is coming, sooner than I'd like."

And it's – it hasn't lost the lightness, it's still a joke, but Skye imagines she can hear a hint of regret there.

Skye sometimes wonders how her life would have been if Coulson had been her SO and not Ward (she doesn't think about Ward much these days, which is, _good_ , she guesses). Like, she is genuinely curious how Coulson as an SO would act with her. She knows why he doesn't do that anymore. She knows he was Akela Amador's SO back in the day. Yeah, she knows why Coulson wouldn't want to do that again.

She thinks about that, about Akela and what Coulson had to go through that time, and she thinks (she doesn't want to but she does) about Ward and about HYDRA and she wonders how Coulson is able to gather the strength to trust another human being ever again.

Skye thinks about this and feels her heartbeat in her throat. _Fuck_.

"Good job," he repeats. " _Take_ the compliment. It's an order."

And Skye knows he can't technically order her around anymore but of course he can.


	2. here comes the heat before we meet (a little bit closer)

  


  


"Technology is amazing," Coulson says, once FitzSimmons have finished prepping him.

Skye agrees, not really feeling like she should; technology is amazing, and it might as well get him killed.

Fitz has developed a new system of comms, a micro and an receiver so small he's bragging they are the smallest in the world. He attaches them behind Coulson's ear and on his neck, under the shirt, and Simmons has developed a layer of fake skin to cover them, concealing the devices completely – actually Simmons developed the material for medical uses, to cover wounds while letting the skin breathe.

This mission is not that different from the last one, the one Coulson and Skye went in together: get in, get the intel on HYDRA's operations and find out where they are keeping the hostages. They can't really coordinate an attack from the outside if they don't know the layout of the place. And you can't know the layout of this particular place from the outside, it's protected by some seriously-warped anti-spy device the bad guys shouldn't even have. Hell, the good guys shouldn't have something like that either.

This mission is no different than the last one, except it's about a million times more dangerous and Coulson is going on his own.

That should be a relief, shouldn't. She doesn't have to risk her life.

"Does this thing even work?" Coulson is saying, moving arificially and carefully, like he doesn't trust the integrity of the invention.

"Yeah, I can hear you. Can you hear me?" Skye asks halfheartedly from the other side of the lab.

Coulson nods. He climbs out of the chair and tries walking a bit, seeing if it feels natural. He crosses the room and sits near Skye. Obviously he can notice she's in a bad mood; anyone could, probably even Fitz could tell she's in a bad mood and Fitz is Fitz.

"What's with the face?" he asks her.

_What's with the face? There's a lot with the face. The face is because you might die_. She doesn't say this.

"I don't know. This sounds dangerous."

"You know how important this one is," he argues. Like she had a say at all in whether he does this or not. "You were the one who cracked the info about what they were doing here."

"I know." She knows.

"What's wrong?" he asks. It occurs to Skye that maybe it's not evident for him. She wonders how he would react if the tables were turned and she was the one walking into mortal danger.

"It's just that... I wish you didn't have to go alone, sir."

She always uses _sir_ like a weapon, like a shield, like a wall.

"I'll have you in my ear the whole time," he says. "I know I'm in good hands."

Responsibility on this, she thinks. _Great_.

"Speaking of hands, give me yours," she tells him.

Coulson does, extending his arm to her, without question.

She takes out something that looks like a wristwatch but isn't.

"We can't map the place from outside," Skye tells him. "But with this thing we can see how it's in there as you walk through, so I can tell you where to go, you won't be as much in the dark."

"I thought they had a system against this kind of stuff."

"No, this doesn't work like that. Fitz and I came up with this way... look, I won't bore you with the details. Think about it as inspired in WWII submarine sonars. Do you like that?"

Coulson smiles warmly at her. Skye reaches her hands to his arm to put on the device. She has to roll up the sleeve of his shirt first and she's not sure why she's doing it instead of telling Coulson to do it himself, or why he lets her. It's weirdly intimate and she can feel both the soft layer of hair of his arm and the sensitive skin of the inside of his forearm under her fingertips. She slips on the wristwatch next, her thumb pausing on the beatland of his pulse for a moment. When it's done and she has closed the clasp over his wrist she still holds his hand in both of hers for a moment. She has a weird unexpected flash of the time when Coulson took the electronic bracelet off her wrist and it was almost the exact gesture – her hand in both his, and the pause, and the not knowing what the pause means. Skye finally lets him go, his fingers slipping through her, brushing against the palm of her hand.

 

+

 

There's nothing simple about this mission, she realizes. She realizes a little too late.

There's nothing simple: Coulson has to pose as the enemy – _Hail HYDRA_ forever and ever amen – and make it stick long enough so he can be snooping around the place, long enough so he can find the hostages, pinpoint the place so that May and Trip and their assault team can do the rest.

That and he has to hope he doesn't get trapped in the crossfire, of course.

 

+

 

It's weirdly intimate, her being in his ear, talking words only he can hear, being her guide in this place.

The images on her computer flicker into life every few seconds, giving her an eventual layout of the place. Every step he takes the picture gets more complete. Of course every step Coulson takes who knows what can be waiting for him in the dark.

"Left," she says and he walks into that darkness, trusting her voice.

"Down that corridor," she says and he walks down that corridor, blind trust.

"This is strange," Coulson says, waiting for her next direction. "You're my eyes down here."

But Skye doesn't want to give him more orders. Every time she gives one she regrets it for a moment, for the brief second in which she doesn't know if she has just sent him into danger and death. She doesn't want to hold that much power over his fate. Actually what she wants to tell him is to curl up into a ball in a corner and wait for help, to hell with the mission.

"You know, these gadgets are amazing," he tells her. "I can hear you worry all the way from here."

She makes an strangled, choking noise.

"It's okay," he tells her, like she is the one in the darkness and he is the one guiding her with just his voice. She'd much prefer that scenario. "It's fine, you are doing great, Skye."

I don't want to do great, she wants to say. Is it too late to change my mind?

She doesn't say that. Instead:

"Right down this next door."

She can hear steps, then a pause.

"Skye? Congratulations. I think you've found the hostages."

 

+

 

There's gunfire.

"My position has been compromised," is the last thing Skye hears from him (not to her, to May, probably) before she hears gunshots.

And of course there's shooting and of course she can't do anything about it from here, only shout his name in his ear – if he even can hear her anymore.

"Coulson, are you there...?"

Nothing.

What can she do, from where she is, safe in her little van?

"... _Coulson_?"

Silence.

Then: "...yeah?"

She breathes out, but it's just a reflex thing. Everything is still horrible and she's still in the dark about what's going on there.

"Talk to me," she orders. And it is an order.

" _Skye_."

He sounds weird, like half out of it.

"Coulson, talk to me."

"I've been hit," he's saying. "I'm bleeding."

Okay, Skye thinks, maybe not so much with the talking to me, if you're just going to say horrible things.

Skye thinks: I'm not going to do this, I'm not going to talk to you while you die, I can't. There are too many things, for a start. _I can't_.

"It's all right," Coulson says. Skye can hear his labored breathing clearer than his words. "It's going to be all right."

That's, of course, when the comms go dead, lines snapped, intercepted, who knows. What Skye knows is that there's no sound. No noise of gunshot and she kind of preferred that to this ignorance she's trapped in right now. It's like somebody had killed the lights on her in an unfamiliar room. She does not dare to move, does not deare to breathe.

He could be dead.

He could be lying dead on the ground and she wouldn't know.

That's horrifying. More horrifying than the simple fact of his death (he's not dead, he can't, this is an hypotheses, this is Skye making mental exercises because she thinks she's on to something, because it's a distraction, because her bones ache) is the fact that she wouldn't know. She wouldn't be there. He could be dead and _alone_.

The comms stay dead for thirty-nine seconds.

Thirty-nine seconds.

_Thirty-nine seconds_.

Skye thinks it's the longest measure of time humanity has come up with. Thirty-nine.

Then the screeching sound of static coming back.

Then: "Skye?"

It's May.

"May!" Skye almost – well, pretty much, cries.

"It's okay," the other woman says and Skye can tell she's breathless, edgy with effort but trying to be kind to Skye. "We got the hostages. We got Coulson. It's okay."

 

+

 

Sometimes she wishes she was May, or at least more like May. Being able to sweep in and save the day, being able to protect. 

(being able to protect him)

She wishes she could be like May, larger than life, and so trustworthy when it comes to these things.

May takes them out, all of them.

They don't lose any hostage.

_May_ doesn't lose any hostage.

May approaches her. Skye knows she wasn't supposed to leave the van but – 

"Hey. Are you fine?" May asks.

"I'm going to _kill him_ ," Skye says between her teeth.

May gives her a tired look, but doesn't seem to want to stop Skye. She probably wants to kill Coulson as well.

 

+

 

Simmons is patching him up in the lab.

When Skye walks in the first thing she sees is Coulson's shirt, discarded, thrown in the bin, soaking with red. Skye swallows.

Coulson is sitting in one of the stools, t-shirt rolled up (t-shirt also ruined, also to be thrown away) while Simmons is applying the sutures. He is making little wincing grimaces that would be funny under other circumstances.

Skye walks up to them, not sure what she wants to say. Even less sure of what might actually come out of her mouth. One thing probably has nothing to do with the other.

She just stares at the state of him for a moment. He looks ragged and fragile and – yes, she is going to go there – he looks fucking old. Old enough to have died in a dark tunnel without her knowing. There's hot anger tickling the back of Skye's throat.

"You're bleeding," she says, an accusation. "I'm going to kill you. I'm never doing this again."

"You're not doing this again," he repeats. Skye knows he doesn't get it.

God, he doesn't get it at all, does he.

"I don't care if you give me orders. Next time you find yourself somebody else to talk into your ear _as you die_."

From the corner of her eye Skye can see Simmons' absolutely petrified expression. Simmons is no stranger to rows with Coulson; hell, Skye has seen Simmons shout at him. But she has never talked to Coulson in quite the voice Skye is using now.

Coulson sits up, stiff and straight. She can see the color coming back to his pale face but now the color is anger, too. He looks exactly like Skye feels.

"Excuse me," he says. "I'm the one who got shot."

"I had to listen to you _getting shot_ over the comm. How do you think that felt?"

"I can't imagine it felt good, no," he replies, but it's not nice, his voice is not nice at all.

"No."

They stare at each other. Simmons is looking on like she is expecting them to hit each other, like she is looking around to push the valuable objects out of the way, just in case. Well, Skye thinks, maybe Simmons is not too off the mark.

She wants to hit Coulson.

Probably.

Simmons moves into their space, not exactly between them, but close enough to make a conciliatory gesture.

"Please, Skye, can you stop disturbing my patient."

She turns to Simmons, her ears suddenly very hot.

"I'm disturbing him? He tried to get killed _while I was listening_."

"You're disturbing each other. Stop it."

"This was the mission," Coulson says, like she is an idiot or something.

"Yeah? Was that the misson? You don't say. Next time there's a mission like this one please remember to _not include me_. Do you think you can do me that favor, Coulson? Do you think you'll be able to manage?"

She's unhinged. She could say anything now. Anything. It's a good thing she's so angry, she decides. A good thing _he_ is so angry. That way she can't let it show, that way he can't tell how afraid she's been.

"No, don't worry about that, Skye," he replies in the same incendiary, ugly tone of hers. "Don't worry about getting called for the next mission, if you are going to act like this."

"God, you're such an ass!" she snaps, logic and manners forgone, turning around, unable to fucking stand his face.

"That might as well be," he is saying and Skye can hear, can _feel_ , something ugly crawling up his throat. "But you are –"

"Stop shouting at each other! Why are you shouting at each other?!"

They both turn to Simmons. She has her eyes closed for a moment, like she can't quite bear the sound of the words she's hearing. Coulson throws Skye a sharp glance – like saying _look what you've done_ , which is so, so frustrating – but thankfully he doesn't seem that interested in continuing with the shouting.

Not so thankfully, though. Skye wants to keep on shouting at him. She wants him to scream at her. It's horrible, it's so horrible, but it's so much better than the other thing.

Coulson takes the gauze out of Simmons' hands, climbs out of the chair.

"I'll be in my office," he says, low and slow and incandescent with rage.

"What the hell was that?" Simmons asks Skye, once they hear Coulson finish climbing the stairs.

Skye shakes her head, not at Simmons though.

"I don't know what the hell that was," she admits, marching off to Coulson's office, because she knows she has to make this right.

 

+

 

He still hasn't changed into another suit and it's still baffling and disturbing, seeing him in that white t-shirt all smeared with blood on his left side.

Skye knocks at his door, even though she's pretty sure he wouldn't have left it open unless he wanted her to come in.

"God, Coulson, I'm so sorry," she starts, in a rush, all the things she's just said coming back to her, and _how could she_. He almost died and here she was screaming insults at him. "All those things I've said. I don't know how I could. You... you don't deserve that."

She sounds sickly apologetic, even to herself, pathetic, but it seems like it's enough because when Coulson turns to her Skye can see his own anger drain from his face drop by drop.

"This kind of missions," he says, his voice not completely his own just yet. "They've been known to get under people's skins. It's okay."

No, it's not okay. She doesn't want him to tell her it's okay. She wants him to ask what the hell is wrong with her. Skye thinks that if he asked, if he demanded it of her, she might be able to figure out exactly what is wrong with her. 

"It's not okay," she says. "I'm sorry, Simmons is right. I don't know why I overreacted."

"You don't?" he asks. It's almost a throwaway question, but there's some curiosity there.

"I thought you were dying," she says, simply.

Coulson seems taken aback by her honesty. Like he wasn't expecting it.

"Our line of work –" he starts. She is not interested in their line of work.

"I thought you were _dying_ ," Skye repeats, gritting her teeth. It's not anger anymore what she feels.

It was never anger.

It was never anger, you see.

He doesn't seem to know what to say to that. He says: "I'm sorry."

Skye shakes her head.

"I was _terrified_ for you."

At that he looks at her – okay, Skye is not sure how he's looking at her right now, except that he looks like no one has ever been this terrified for him before and that's just plain wrong, Skye thinks, what kind of life has he lived until now.

Then it's like everything happens in slow-motion and also in a flash. Skye can feel his arms around her neck and her shoulders before she actually sees Coulson moving towards her to pull her into a hug. She can smell the blood and the disinfectant on him before she realizes he's holding her. They crash against each other's bodies with a vicious grip, though, Coulson's touch on her back jolting her into grabbing him just as closely. It's like the terror and exhaustion of the day, for both of them, finally finds a way to come to the surface. It's not quietly, it spurts, like blood out of an open wound. Skye presses her palms against his ribs. Coulson exhales againt her hair, breath hot and sweet and unfamiliar.

"I'm sorry, I was, too," he's saying.

" _I'm sorry_ ," Skye thinks he keeps saying over and over but she can't be sure, she can't quite hear him, blood in her ears and her face to tightly pressed against the fabric of his t-shirt, her face too completely and blissfully hidden into the hollow of his collarbone.

_What the hell is wrong with you?_ the voice is still saying inside Skye's head.

_What the hell is wrong with you?_ and Skye thinks she finally knows what it is.

_Oh no_ , she thinks. _No, please, no._


	3. here come the dreams (of you and me)

  


  


Finally some glamour.

She's been waiting for a mission like this one for ages.

An elegant party, music, dressing up in new clothes.

And hacking. This part is very important. The mission is stealing information, just right up her alley and something she hasn't done in a while, she wouldn't want to get rusty. So stealing files it is this time. While looking fabulous, hopefully.

But to be completely honest she does feel a bit self-conscious when she has to appear in the lab with this damn silly dress. It's dark blue and classy and open-back and Skye has never worn something like this in her life. Doesn't know _how_ she's supposed to wear it. Despite her excitement at the words _party_ and _filthy rich_ Skye doesn't really know about how to behave in these events. It's not like her life has been filled with high society soirées.

She isn't even sure if this ridiculous dress looks good on her.

(if it's not denim and it's not plaid, how can she know, really)

"Skye!" Simmons lets out a shriek of delight. "You look lovely."

"Yeah," Fitz agrees, flustered. "Yeah, yeah, lovely, that's – that's _a dress_."

"Nothing escapes you. Uh?" Skye teases him.

"Give us a twirl," Trip says. Skye does, a bit self-consciously. Trip smiles that slow smile of his, the smooth bastard. " _Stunning_."

Then they all turn to Coulson. Simmons looks particularly expectant to know if he makes a comment about the dress.

"It's adequate for the job," Coulson says. _Really_? That gains him a hard stare from both Simmons and Trip.

"It's adequate for the job?" Skye repeats in disbelief. "Stop it, boss, you will make a girl blush."

He's wearing the classic tux and looks like he's never worn anything else in his entire life.

"We'll be late," he says simply.

 

+

 

"Who are we going as?" she asks, as their car pulls up at the entrance. Skye tries not to be impressed, before they're even in, by the size of the house.

Coulson gives their invitation a glance. "What do you mean? We already have the invitation."

Invitations are easy. Fake names rest easily on a guest list. Parties are not so careful with the background checks as they should be. Easier than getting a pass to one of HYDRA's headquarters. It took Skye a total of like six minutes to get them on the list – and that's just because she was on her lunch break.

"Yes, but who are these people whose invitations we have? What's the story here?"

"Keep it simple," Coulson says. "Think about the kind of people gathered here."

"Bad people."

"Mostly. But also really shallow people. That's the story. If they ask I'm a business man and you are my mistress."

Skye kind of hates the word _mistress_ on his lips, kind of hates the mental image it conveys. She and Coulson, they would never be that kind of thing. They are never going to be _any_ kind of thing, Skye reminds herself, but definitely not something like that.

 

+

 

Why do all these rich and evil people's houses look like something copied (but too glossy and too clean) from a seaside European town? At least Quinn actually lived in Malta to justify it.

Skye doesn't exactly dislike the high-as-the-night ceilings and the bright chandeliers. It's almost enough to forget the evil people who own it. Crossing the luxurious gates of the mansion, arm in arm with Coulson, is also not the worst thing that has ever happened to Skye.

"I see six suits," Skye says once they are inside, scanning for bodyguards. "You?"

"Seven," Coulson replies. "Look behind the cocktail bar."

He's right. She doesn't hide her admiration.

"You're good."

Coulson nods graciously: "Well, I've been doing this a lot longer than you."

 

+

 

"Oh, the usual suspects," she says, gesturing around the room.

"I see what you mean."

Here they are, the vultures who wanted to make a business out of SHIELD's downfall, they know most of them by reputation.

The ones who pillaged the research and plagiarized the technology to advance their own agendas. Most of these people just want money, but Skye and Coulson can spot a couple of them who want to much more than that, who wants something more dangerous than that. 

Their host is one of those, and the sooner they figure out his exploit the better.

But not before mingling a bit. For the mission that is. So they won't look suspicious. It's not like Skye is having fun or anything. She is a preofessional It's not like she's never been in a fancy-ass party like this one.

"Are you sure you want to be drinking for this?" Coulson gives her champagne glass a pointed look.

Skye rolls her eyes. "Please, Coulson. I know how to make it last. You have any idea how long I could be drinking from just one beer when I was scamming frat boys at pool?"

"You did that."

"A girl's got to eat." She shrugs.

Coulson seems actually amused by the story, not judgemental. He already knew Skye had a less than glowing criminal record when he invited her to the Bus, it's not the time to start complaining about that now.

"It'ss amazing how all these people are willing to get into bed with evil masterminds, just like that," Skye comments, fake-smiling around the room.

"For a good percentage of the winnings," Coulson points out, unable to hide his disgust. Yeah, Skye couldn't imagine someone like him ever doing anything for money. Or herself, for that matter. Skye thinks, vaguely, about Miles and feels that old emptinesstugging at the center of her.

They have time. They don't have to do the job immediately. In fact it's better if they enjoy their time here for a bit, let people see them; going straight for the target would raise a lot of suspicions. They have to blend as much as they possibly can. That means fitting in with the general mood of the party.

That means – 

"I think this is where we are supposed to dance," she says. Dancing has always been an integral part of this plan, or so Skye is willing to swear under oath.

"I think you are right."

Skye doesn't know why she imagined he'd be awkward about this. Of course Coulson wouldn't be awkward about this, this is a job, they are on a mission, and anyway he's not the kind of guy who'd get awkward just by the idea of dancing with a subordinate.

"So... I just realized that I have no idea how to dance," she confesses. Not this kind of music, anyway. But then again Skye is not going to tell him all about country dancing competitions in Austin. It's a bit late for that, though, these doubts, because Coulson has already grabbed her hand and is now dragging her to the center of the room, with the rest of the guests who are already swaying to the gentle instrumental music.

Yes, this place has a live orchestra and all.

Now he definitely looks amused at Skye's sudden reticence.

"Don't worry, it's not that hard," he says, all smooth and confident and annoying. "Just let yourself be led."

His hand on her back is something so solid and so safe Skye finds it easy to just follow his movements in the dance floor.

And okay she's not – she's not a great dancer, but this is not a competition and she is not doing visibly worse than the other couples in the party.

And it's not even so weird, at least at first. It's good that Coulson knows what he's doing (Skye would have totally called bingo on this particular Things Agent Coulson Probably Knows How To Do Very Well card, by the way, no surprises here) and she just has to let him move her to the music. Her hand rests happily in his – he doesn't have big hands but compared to hers they seem like it, his fingers engulf hers in perfect safety It's not weird and it's even sort of nice, putting her arm around his shoulder so casually. Like she could get used to it. Except no, she can't get used to it, she is aware of that.

"You see the access to the second floor?" he says, close to her ear.

"Yeah, I spotted it before," she replies. "I don't see much security upstairs. They must be busy with the guests."

"Good."

"Yes. This plan might even work."

"It _will_ work," Coulson says.

She thinks Coulson is pushing their bodies together a bit closer now, but she might be wrong; it's too subtle a pressure, his hand on the small of her back and with this dress is like she was naked in front of him or something. It pretty much is the most naked she's been in front of him, bare shoulders and back legs and stupid, stupid dress. She doesn't think about that. _Naked_ , no, not a word she wants to be thinking about right now. Skye kind of regrets her choice of attire for a moment, then he moves his fingers (to lead her in the dance, nothing else, of course) and his fingertips settle over the ridge of her spine and Skye doesn't regret the dress at all.

"At least look like you're having fun, soldier," Coulson tells her. She must have been making what he mistakes for a preoccupied face.

"I _am_ having fun," she says without thinking.

His lips curl up. "I'm glad. I wouldn't want you to mistake this for work or anything."

"You know what I mean."

"I know."

He moves his shoulder so that Skye's arm falls closer to his neck, holding him closer. They are dancing a bit slower now, a bit more like just swaying to a shared rhythm. Suddenly she is very aware of the shape of his body, outlined against the edges of her own. It goes back to being just as weird as Skye always imagined having dancing with Coulson would be. But it never really stops being nice.

He has a serious look on his face.

"What?" Skye asks.

"I'm sorry about the _adequate for the job_ comment from before. I don't know why I said that," he shakes his head, all apologetic and kind. "You obviously look great."

 

+

 

Getting the files is not that difficult.

She didn't imagine it would be – these millionaire types, well, they do spend a small fortune on their software security, but a small fortune never really buys you the best skills out there. Skye knows this: once upon a time she was the best skills out there, and she always did it for free.

As they suspected there wasn't much security in the second floor and Coulson spotted what must be the master bedroom in like, seconds. They slip in, unnoticed and it's almost too easy. Skye doesn't dwell on that, she is not prepared for this mission to go south. She's also not prepared for this mission to end so soon.

Coulson takes up watch while she cracks and makes a copy of the files.

"I guess I'm not too useful during this part of the job," he says and turns around for a moment. Occupied, but alert, Skye throws him a grin. "Maybe I should learn."

"To hack?"

"Yes."

"Sure, I can teach you," she tells him. Not looking up from the computer. He's joking and she is teasing him and Skye finds she's enjoying herself right now. "I've taught people way dumber than you."

"A glowing compliment," he says, his voice tinged with delight.

 

+

 

The tall guard is walking towards them.

They are in the hallway, just outside the master bedroom. This doesn't look good. Skye turns to Coulson. When she said she wanted the full undercover-in-a-party experience she wasn't talking about this. She really wasn't.

She looks at him in the eye.

"Kiss me," she tells him. She tries to make it sound like an order but– 

Coulson looks horrified. "What?"

She doesn't really have time to explain in detail; she was kind of hoping he had noticed the guard and caught her drift.

"Fake-undercover-kiss me," she breathes out, throwing a warning look towards the end of the hallway."Now. He's coming this way."

"I'm not going to kiss you."

He sounds definitive.

Coulson's going to throw this mission because he finds the thought of kissing her so repulsive. Skye can't believe it. She needs a plan B. Okay, she has a plan B. It's the same as plan A but she reduces it by degrees, hoping he'll buy it this time.

"Okay, then fake-undercover- _hug_ me. Quick, _sell it_."

Fortunately he does as she tells him this time. Skye puts her hands on his back, pulling him until his face is set against her neck, until his face is hidden. She feels the sharp bite of electricity when his mouth somehow connects with her skin by accident. The bodyguard approaches and Skye lets out a loud, fake-drunken laugh. It takes Coulson a moment to react, but then his hands suddenly drift low on her hips, and he _is_ convincing.

"Hey, this area is off limits," the bodyguard says. "Who are you?"

Skye flashes him a charming, chipper smirk. She tries to look sexed-up and disoriented.

"Oh, yeah, sorry. We didn't know."

"We didn't know," Coulson repeats, carefully slurring his words, disentangling himself from Skye but touching her everywhere in the process. Selling it. Selling it well. Hand open-palmed and dirty and low and knowing on her waist.

"He got a bit frisky," Skye explains to the guard.

" _Frisky_ , mmm," Coulson repeats her words again, smelling her neck lasciviously. It should be disgusting but Skye can't forget it's Coulson underneath that mask.

And it turns out Coulson is very good at this, he's fantastic at playing drunk (do they teach you that at the Academy or is he a natural?), and he is _very_ convincing at playing the horny companion: he has Skye's arm in a loose grip and he's grinning stupidly at the bodyguard towering over him, and then he is placing one wet, sloppy kiss on Skye's bare shoulder, followed by a chuckle that is all warm breath over her skin. And okay, she's no idiot, she knows it's fake, she knows it's just misdirection, a trick, a tool of the trade, but it's not like she can help it, the way her skin seems to catch fire, and all the air goes out of her lungs, as if she had fallen and hit the ground hard.

She's so flushed her nerve ends tingle, almost painfully. Which, she guesses, helps sell the story to the guard even more.

"Okay, but this area is off limits," the man repeats, trying to push them in the direction of the ballroom.

Skye and Coulson are quicker, they don't need to be hauled.

"Fine, fine," Coulson is saying over his shoulder, the fake drunken drawl so perfect even Skye is impressed. "Killjoy."

And he leads her back to the party, and as long as the guard is still following them with his gaze Coulson keeps his hand on Skye's back, fingers spread obscenely over a spot where there is no dress.

 

+

 

"Have you cracked the encryption on the files yet?" he asks her, hours later, when she's sitting on her bed, working. 

She is thankfully back in her normal, plain, unsexy clothes, her hair in a braid, and not wearing that dress and pretending to be something she's obviously not.

"Of course," she replies. "Who do you take me for?"

"Good job," he says. He's still wearing that fucking tux, though.

"This guy is up to no good, boss," she tells him. "He's Ian Quinn levels of up to no good. But with less shooting me in the stomach. Which I appreciate."

"Yes, everything went pretty smooth," he says, sounding unconvinced.

"Is everything went that smooth... what's up with your face?"

He shifts his weight from one foot to the other, looking down, Skye knows that gesture.

"I feel like I have to apologize for what happened at the party?" He is not sure of it.

"What happened at the party?" she asks, then she notices his eyes, the shame. "Oh, you mean _that_."

"Yes."

"Don't worry about it. We were undercover – it's not like it was really you, doing that to really me."

He tilts is head a bit. Yeah, Skye wonders at her own choice of words, too.

"I didn't want you put in that position," he tells her. "This wasn't supposed to be the mission."

Skye puts the laptop away, shifts on the bed.

"You realize I understand the concept of undercover, right?"

Not to mention I was the one who started it. Not to mention I asked you to kiss me. (And you didn't)

"Even so. You didn't have to be subjected to that. We're not spies. You don't have to– "

He sounds like he knows a whole lot about spies and what they have to do. He sounds like he knows more about that sort of thing than he'd really like to.

"It's okay," Skye reassures him. "It didn't bother me."

And it didn't really. At leas not in the way he is implying. 

"Well, it did bother me, acting like that," he says and takes a step back, like he's said more than he was initially planning to. "I'm sorry. I guess I just... I didn't want you to see me like that."

And she gets it. She's not dumb. She knows what kind of man Coulson is and why he is exactly this uncomfortable with the whole charade and how it went down. 

"Coulson, wait, step on the brakes. I got it, I knew that wasn't you, couldn't be you. I knew you were there underneath, the real you, that's why it didn't bother me, because I knew it wasn't real."

He runs one hand over his face, looking inconceivably tired.

"Perhaps I should leave all this undercover stuff to you from now on," he says, sighing a bit. "Obviously I'm not cut out for it."

He walks away from her bunk without further explanation.

For a moment Skye wonders what the hell is wrong with him.

  



	4. here comes the spark before the dark (come a little closer)

  


  


She hasn't worn her hair this short since she was a kid, and now she knows why. Her face looks too round, too full. It doesn't really suit her. She looks in the mirror and doesn't like her face.

She let the hair longer at the sides, but at the back of her neck razor-short – it's fashionable in a way (it doesn't look good on her), it's fashionable in the way her undercover identity would like it. At least she gets to take her own clothes with her (except for a leather jacket she's not sure where SHIELD got from, much more battered and edgy than her own) and look reasonably decent – she wouldn't want to overdo it with the Lisbeth Salander look, that would probably arise more suspicions than her healthy looks.

But she can't be Skye of Rising Tide, because everybody knows Skye of Rising Tide changed sides, even if there is no record of her involvement with SHIELD, not anymore, not since she herself erased it.

She has to be someone else.

Skye is good at being someone else.

"Ugh."

"Is there a problem?" Coulson catches her as she is drying her new hair.

"I've worn my hair long since forever," she tells him. "This is... different for me."

"The sacrifices we make for the job," he comments knowingly.

"It's only hair, Coulson."

"Yes, but the little things, they do pile up."

"Yeah but on the other hand we are saving the world. Who wouldn't want to do this job?"

Coulson gives her a sad smile. "I didn't. For a while."

She doesn't ask what changed. She's afraid of the answer.

She turns around, looking in the mirror again. Awful.

"Ugh, I look like a little kid."

Coulson shakes his head (she sees his reflection in the mirror): "No, you don't."

 

+

 

She knows the job is dangerous but she doesn't realize how dangerous until she catches Coulson and May discussing it. She doesn't mean to spy, she's just stuck, can't very well walk into the conversation and can't risk walking away in case they hear her.

"She's going to get hurt," May is saying, quietly but fiercely.

"She's not going to get hurt." Coulson sounds tired.

"You're going to make sure of that?"

"Yes, I am."

"You're a fool. You're both fools, but at least she doesn't know better."

"Melinda..." and fuck it must be serious, Skye thinks, when she hears the way Coulson says May's name.

"She's going to get hurt and she's going to get killed and all because she'd do anything to impress you and you're too stupid to –"

Skye walks away swiftly, hoping her retreat is silent and stealthy enough because she can't hear another word.

 

+

 

Getting in is easy.

She's been working this cover for months, creating this identity, brushing up on her old cracking skills – it's been a long time since her exploits turned this destructive.

The group needs coders and this where she comes in. The group needs coders and people who are unfazed by alien technology. The team can't believe they are the ones following on this particular trail; human software controlling alien weapons, Skye shudders just thinking about it. Fitz explains all the possible applications and she shudders again. In a post-SHIELD world this is the kind of thing that could blow up in everybody's faces, because no one is paying attention.

"You know once you're in you can't contact me, outside our planned meetings," Coulson reminds her.

"I know."

"You'll be on your own," he repeats.

"It'll be fine."

"You just have to blend in, do a good job, no one is asking you to make a any decisions in there," he explains. She _knows_. She knows the plan inside out, if only because they have been polishing the details together for weeks now.

She'll meet Coulson once a week for an update. The rest of the time she'll be alone. This doesn't bother her too much. Living in a motel doesn't worry her either. It's kind of nostalgic, if she thinks about it. She finds it easy to slip into people she's already been. Living hand-to-mouth, with just a few possessions, and working on something clandestine, murderous hours, yes, Skye definitely has been this person.

 

+

 

The first time they make contact, set up their story, he's also undercover in a way. He pretends to pick her up in a bar. It's a dingy but safe place at the edge of town. It's not sleazy or anything, not the kind of place where his presence would ring any alarm (Skye can blend in, Coulson is normally too clean-looking for this stuff).

"Can I buy you a drink?" Coulson starts, speaking loudly, just in case somebody is listening, watching their moves.

Skye turns to him. Even out of his work clothes he looks too much like Coulson to concentrate.

"Hi," she says, more to Coulson than to the pretend interested guy.

The bartender brings them a couple of beers, passes a bored glance over them.

For a moment Skye wonders, if they were complete strangers, would she be the kind of girl Coulson would sit next to in a bar, buy a drink for. She knows the answer is "no".

"No problems?"

"None so far. They kind of received me with open arms."

"Suspicious?"

"Not really. They put me on an important project straight away. Apparently my credentials were enough."

She had been working on that for months, building an online presence again, becoming the kind of hacker whoever funds this group would be interested in hiring. She's not surprised. She knows what she can do and the value these shady types would put on those skills.

"First impressions?" Coulson asks her.

Skye takes a sip of her drink.

"The place we've been working on, it's the kind of place you'd see in the movies and think _ah, secret anarchist lair_ but I've worked on those places before and this is not it."

"What do you mean?"

"It's a front. In case we are found out. Whoever set this up has a lot of money – the place is shabby but Coulson, you should see the equipment. And the specs. They're very precise. We're just the code guys but I'm positive the boss already got his hands on alien tech."

"That's dangerous," Coulson comments.

"Yeah. Most of the people in this group, they are doing this out of curiosity, they have no idea their work could cost a lot of lives."

"Don't rush anything," he tells her, picking on her agitation. "The only way to shut this down is finding out who's behind the money. And you can only find that out if you're careful now. You don't have to fix this in a week."

Skye smiles at him, but it's a bit contrived. She was thinking she wanted to fix this in a week. Every day is a day more those dangerous items are in the wrong hands, one day more the bad guys have to figure out how to use them. Good guys are careful, but bad guys are quick.

Coulson looks worried, too. Skye takes the chance to look at him while he's lost in thought, processing what she has just told him. Of course there are many things to be worried about in this situation. She also knows he doesn't like that she's on this mission on her own, for so long. But she is here now, doing this, so that must mean he thinks she can do it.

It occurs to her that they are not doing a great job of pretending to be part of the Friday crowd, they don't look like a girl and the guy who is trying to get her to leave the place with him.

"Smile, soldier," she tells him. "We're in a bar. Pretend you like me."

 _Pretend you'd go home with me. Pretend you'd put your hands over the length of my body. Pretend you'd pull the blinds on my dirty motel room and you'd press your mouth between my legs_. Skye is slowly, methodically unravelling here.

Shit, Skye thinks. She's in over her head. This mission is complicated enough without this.

"Yeah," Coulson says, looking anything but prone to smiling right now.

There's a explosion of laughter behind them, by the people playing pool, and she and Coulson, startled, look at each other and smile. He remembers to be more professional, that is, _less professional_ and he shifts on his sit to get closer, like a guy hitting on a girl like Skye would. He brings his arm low around Skye's waist, pulling her to his conspiratory voice.

"Were you able to make a copy of the work?" he asks.

Skye nods. He looks at her expectantly, she looks around. "No, not here. Five minutes, toilet. Ladies, obviously."

She waits for him in one of the stalls – a movement that says more random hook-up in a bar than secret undercover mission, so that should be fine. She pulls the card out from under her bra (she's not being nostalgic, she has yet to find a safer place for this) so that she doesn't have to make the gesture in front of Coulson (once in her life is enough, thank you).

There's a knock on the door.

"No one else here?" she asks as she lets him inside and locks the door behind. She realizes there's not nearly enough room here for two people, not even close. Every part of her body seems to be touching a part of Coulson's without meaning to, out of uncomfortable necessity.

"A couple of guys gave me a look as I walked in, but no, no one else, " he says.

"Well, that's just because they probably thought you were going to –" she pauses because suddenly she sees a flash of what those guys must have thought Coulson was going to do to her in the ladies' and she has a flash of exactly what _she_ imagines Coulson could do to her right in this stall. She feels dirty and unfair to him and she cannot stop it, cannot stop it at all. "Nevermind. Here, this is the work we've done all week."

She hands him the memory card. Coulson takes out his phone and downloads its contents. He seems to be thinking absolutely nothing of the way his hipbone is pressed against Skye's side (or the way she's pressing back, ever so slightly, and only for a brief, blinding moment), like he's done something like this a hundred times in previous missions. She wonders if he's done something like this.

"I'll send this to Fitz," he says when he's finished, giving her back the card. She hides it inside her bra again, and this time he is here to see her do it. He says nothing, his eyes only vaguely interested in the movement of her fingers for a moment, for the bit where he's not exactly sure what they're doing.

They plan their next meeting, exactly one week from now. A hotel, they can do hotels from now on. Skye wonders if that's going to be better or worse, in her current condition. She thinks about it like a disease now. They walk out of the bathroom together, much better for their cover (Skye wonders if he is thinking about that party, the Greenville party, and how bad he felt afterwards) and Coulson once more slips his arm around her waist; he stops touching her just for the few moments when he has to pay for their drinks.

They leave the bar and for a while Coulson's hand is still on her back, solid, _hot_ , and she knows it's just precaution, it's just their cover, and yet – 

 

+

 

She's not here to make friends but of course she ends up making them anyway.

Not everyone here must know they are working for the bad guys. These people are not evil, she realizes, just ignorant and careless. She knows that's another form of evil, in a way. There's a girl, Lore, a few years younger than Skye, and a bit more skilled than Skye, who remindss Skye painfully of herself at that age. Sometimes they take coffee breaks together and Skye tells her stories about her life that are fake; the stories Lore tells in kind Skye suspects are fake as well. She tells her co-workers things that are true as well: she tells them where she is staying and they look at her sympathetically. They are right, her motel is mostly a dump, but that's fine, she spends most of her time here in the computer labs anyway.

 

+

 

They never meet in Skye's motel room. It's too risky, he wouldn't want to compromise her like that in the face of the group, and she doesn't know what they'd do to Coulson if they discover him snooping around.

They meet in higher scale hotels in the center of the town, far from the group's usual haunts. They play the card of the illicit lovers or at least they could, it wouldn't be so hard to believe, in one of these places. And she has an excuse, if members of the group catch her – the guy picked me up in a bar and I kept seeing him, he has nothing to do with the work.

He always leaves after Skye has finished giving him the update, but she normally spends the night. The room is paid for anyway, and it means clean bathrooms and soft bedsheets, such a change of pace. She fantasizes about asking Coulson to spend the night once, to see how he'll react, but that's all they are, fantasies: childish, harmless.

Once she is so fed up with eating reheated noodles that she asks if they can have dinner in the hotel restaurant instead. He indulges her but looks fidgety all the time.

("Do you really think they could be following me?" "It's possible. You are a mystery to these people." and Skye thinks about teasing him, saying they should kiss just in case someone is watching, but then she remembers what Coulson feels about the idea of kissing her)

This one time she passes him the memory card under the table, awkwardly fumbling to find his fingers.

 

+

 

It takes her a month to gain the trust of her supervisors.

Her weekly chats in hotel rooms with Coulson extend well into the night, while they try to make sense of the little pieces of information she manages to gather. That's how everything works in the group; every employee only works in a small bit of tech or on an incomplete piece of coding, nobody has enough information to work in something other than the most absolute abstraction. It's a good method. If you are evil, that is.

 

+

 

Skye doesn't know if she is more tired or in pain. Dragging herself to the motel feels more difficult than it's humanly possible. And yet she somehow manages. Maybe it's pure survival instinct.

Who knew government agencies played so rough? But at least she got away – they all got away, which was good, no chance of any of the members of the group spilling any info that might compromise Skye's job. She still doesn't know enough. It's not time to try to pull everybody in.

(she could have stopped all danger and hurt to herself if she'd only said she was SHIELD, if she had only told them "I'm one of the good guys" but she guesses that her blood has bought a lot of goodwill from her bosses, a lot of trust; if that's the case, then it's worth every drop)

She is not even ready to undress and check her wounds, she is going to collapse on her bed and hope she doesn't bleed to death during the night. She just needs some sleep, that's all. But she turns on the lights of her room and– 

"Coulson?"

He's sitting on her bed, obviously waiting. Skye is alarmed he's here, this is not the plan, this is risky, but she cannot hide her relief when she sees his face.

"How did they let you in? And why are you here? We're not supposed to meet until next Friday."

"We got wind of your group's scramble with the NSA."

Oh, she realizes, she hadn't thought about her team finding about about the incident with the authorities; Coulson was worried, maybe.

"I was worried," he adds.

She moves carefully into the room; in part because sudden movements only make the pain worse, in part because she doesn't want Coulson to notice exactly how much pain she's in.

"It was... It was _rough_. But I'm okay," she lies.

"You don't look okay."

"I'm... alive."

"Let's see," he says, softly, like he's a bit frightened to.

Skye feels the heavy dampness in her clothes and hesitates. She's glad she had her jacket inside her bag and it didn't get torn; she doesn't think she could have walked across town in the state she's in otherwise. She'd like to tell Coulson to go away, but she can't do that. And he's right, of course he is, she needs help. She was probably going to bleed to death during the night without him. She takes off her jacket, revealing her ruined shirt, the open gash under the torn fabric. This was a wrong move. She bites her lip and hisses when her clothes move, right over the cut where she fell against the barbed wire, trying to escape the grip of the NSA agent.

She lets the jacket fall on the floor. When she looks up – _Coulson's face_ , shit.

"My god, Skye, what the hell."

She shrugs before she remembers how much that's going to hurt. "I couldn't very well go to a hospital."

"Jesus, come here. Where's your first aid kit?"

"Bathroom."

He disappears into the next room. She sits on the narrow bed. He comes back with the kit and some painkillers.

"This first," he says, bossy as anything, and Skye appreciates that so much. She takes the pills.

Coulson sits next to her. Her examines the damage without touching her, first. Then he grabs her shirt carefully, checking if the blood's made it stick to her skin. It has. It's going to hurt like hell.

"I need to take off your shirt," he tells her.

She's kind of shocked at the tone of complete indifference. She hopes she can copy it when she gives her reply. It's not that she doesn't realize the gravity of the situation, or how completely professional the mood here is – it's just that Coulson just asked her to take off her shirt. In her fantasies it's never like this.

"Mmm, yeah... I guess. Okay. Go on."

He peels the shirt off her expertly, but even so it hurts and she squirms, whinning a bit. She hopes he doesn't think less of her as an agent for that.

Coulson lets out a pained noise when her wounds are completely exposed.

"Does it look bad?" she asks.

"Horrible," he tells her, the humor in his voice managing to soothe her fear a little. "I have to clean it first. Sorry, this is going to hurt."

"I'm a big girl."

Coulson undoes the clasp on her bra and slips the straps off her shoulders swiftly. Skye leaves it on the bed – it's ruined, blood all over it. She crosses her arms in front of her, covering her breasts. She knows she shouldn't worry about modesty right now. She has seen Coulson do this with other people in their team before, she knows he is not seeing her body at all, only the wounds and how he can cure them, take care of them. It doesn't matter, Skye can't think like that, this is still Coulson and his hands might be indifferent and effective but they are still his hands. 

He cleans the wound methodically but slowly.

"The rest of your group?" He asks. "The NSA communication didn't say anything about arrests."

"Everybody got out, as far as I know. Some injuries, I think, nothing serious. And we hit the fail safe before the guys in suits could get their hands on the equipment. They won't have a single piece of evidence. We were lucky."

"Lucky," Coulson repeats, grimly. She can feel his breath on her naked shoulder.

Once clean Skye can feel her wound even more clearly than before, two deep cuts slashing her back in a diagonal, almost straight from right shoulder to left hip. She can feel nerve endings pulsating like they want to split her body in half, and she's aware of every inch of broken skin, the alcohol Coulson has applied burning the edges of the wound until they feel alive. Skye is glad she has her back turn to him so she can make miserable-feeling faces he won't have to see.

"This is all I can do for now," he says.

She can't tell if the pain is actually worse now. She can't come up with any measure of feeling right now, good or bad, hot or cold, there's one one sense: this blinding, deafening ache.

"No, thanks, that actually feels better," she tells him anyway. "I mean, I still feel shitty, but a lot better than fifteen minutes ago."

There's not much else he can do with what they have at hand. Skye just wants to pass out into sweet oblivion and not wake up until the mission is finished and done with. Coulson stays silent for a moment and Skye thinks he must be about to get up from the bed and leave her but then she feels fingertips pressing against the base of her skull.

"You hair has grown a lot in such short time," he says, out of the blue, touching his fingers to the back of her neck. 

Skye feels more than bizarre. Here she is, almost naked, wounded, with Coulson patching her up and touching her neck, and she is feeling such raw, stupid need – all she'd like to do is throw him on this ridiculously small motel bed and press her bruised body against him. It's been brewing for such a long time, from admiration to friendship to a stupid crush to a stupider crush to this, _this_ , and right now she's too weak and tired to stop the flood of emotion; she's been bottling it up for so long now it just overwhelms her. She has more control than to do anything about it, but she can't stop it from affecting her, this time she can't push it down again. She didn't want to _want_ this. She feels like crying out of frustration at herself.

"I think I'd like to lie down," she says, before Coulson gets worried, or worse, before he _notices_.

"Yes. Lie on your stomach. You can't put pressure on your back."

She nods, moving to rest on the bed, pressing her face against the pillow. She's still half-naked in front of him, and with this movement she's sure he's seen her breasts by now, but he doesn't seem to care so she shouldn't, either. She feels his fingers brushing her arm as he helps her settle.

"I'll come back tomorrow," he tells her, voice alarmingly sweet.

"You don't have to do that. You can't risk it."

"No, actually, I have to do that. You need better medicine." He catches her concerned expression, even with half of her face pressed to the pillow. "I'll be careful, I promise. I'll come after sunset."

 

+

 

He comes back the next night, bringing antibiotics and better bandages, better gauze, a lot of other stuff. 

Skye has spent most of the day sleeping, emerging from under the sheets only to go to the bathroom and to slip on the large t-shirt she normally wears to bed, she can't think of wearing anything tighter for now.

Coulson tells her to extend her arm and she does. He grabs her with a firm hand, rolling her t-shirt up her shoulder. She's not sure what to expect until he cleans with spot with damp cotton and produces a needle from his bag. Ah, Skye realizes, she hasn't been thinking about the rust on the barbed wire at all. Good thing her boss thinks about literally everything.

"Thanks. I hadn't thought about that."

He puts new dressings on the wound. 

"You're a good nurse," she says.

"There was a hospital technician in my family. Saw a lot of this growing up."

"It shows," she says, suddenly unbearably touched by his confession.

"You should take a shower now," he says and Skye realizes he's right, because he cleaned the wound but she can feel bits of dry blood and dust and panicked sweat all over her body. "But don't get the dressing wet."

"Okay," she stands up, seeing if she can trust her legs to walk her to the bathroom.

"Do you need help with...?" he gestures towards the next room and it's the first time Skye has seen him less than comfortable with the situation.

But no, she can't imagine Coulson actually helping her get into the shower.

"No, no, no, I'm fine," she tells him. "But... could you stay out here for a bit? In case. I wouldn't like to slip and crack my head open and ruin the whole mission."

She laughs a hollow laugh at that. Coulson gives her a quick glance of concern.

"Of course," he says, making himself comfortable on the bed and grabbing the tv remote.

It's way too weird for Skye, taking a shower, putting her head under the water, knowing he's out there waiting for her. The bathroom door is cracked open, a bit, just in case, but Coulson has turned up the volume of the tv just enough so that Skye knows he can't hear her moving in the shower – she's not sure what to do with the unexpected kindness of that small gesture. The water feels so good and so horrible over her exhausted skin she has to bite the inside of her mouth to stop from whimpering.

 

+

 

He comes back the night after that, bringing her food.

"Coulson, you're a wonder."

She feels better today.

He brings her a new change clothes from the Bus, too, and, blissfully, another bra. He really does think about everything.

"The group sent me a message this afternoon," she tells him while they eat together, sitting on her bed. He's got a salad he's not paying much attention to and Skye is attacking the healing carbohydrates of the fruit and pastries he brought her, with a passion, realizing she hadn't eaten anything all day yesterday. "They've found another location. I go back to work tomorrow night."

He makes a weird face, between worry and exasperation. He puts his food away. Reaching out to Skye he brushes his thumb along her arm, ghost-soft over the spot where he injected her yesterday.

"We can't have a repeat of the other day," he says, sounding like it was Skye's fault or something.

"Well, tell that to the damned NSA."

He looks her in the eye, very serious.

"If you think this is getting too dangerous, we can get you out," he says. "You don't have to kill yourself for this mission. There are other ways to get these people."

"I'm not killing myself. It was just a scratch."

She sees him grit his teeth for a moment. "It wasn't just a scratch, Skye."

She lifts her shoulders, sitting up straight, jaw set and a resolved glint in her eyes.

"I'm an agent, just like you. Would you pull out, if you were in my place?"

He looks like he's thinking about it, but eventually he does Skye the courtesy of telling the truth: "No, I wouldn't."

She arches an eyebrow. And well, this is not news, all Skye has ever wanted to be is more like Coulson.

Then she grins at him.

"But I appreciate your concern."

 

+

 

One month later she's done a good enough job, she's gained enough trust, that the responsible of the project wants to see her face to face. The specs they give her are getting broader and the picture is getting clearer. And now she's been invited to the big house, so to speak.

The night before the meeting she goes see Coulson in a hotel downtown. 

"Once you are in a room with them you activate the tracker," he tells her. "We'll do the rest."

Skye squirms in the bar's stool. They haven't gone up to the room this time. She needed a drink and Coulson didn't protest at all.

"Getting cold feet?" he asks with a magnanimous smile. "This is the home stretch."

Skye can't help thinking about what he said to her once, the thing about them not being spies. She can play at it, but in the end she doesn't have the stomach for the grand reveal.

"They can't treat me worse than the NSA," she jokes. "Can they?"

"Everything will be fine. I have a whole assault team ready. You'll be covered."

"Because never bad has ever happened whenever you've said _Everything will be fine_..."

He looks down. "I know."

Oh, for fuck's sake, now _she_ feels bad. She takes a long sip of her drink.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean that," she says. "I know you won't let anything happen to me."

He looks up at her, eyes clouded with something Skye cannot pinpoint, and that's unusual. His hand comes up to rest on her hip – but not like in the bar that first week of her mission, not like he is trying to sell a story. It's strictly friendly and supportive and comforting. And entirely _Coulson_.

"Something already happened," he says. 

He doesn't say _I already let it happen_ because he wouldn't talk to her in those terms, not if he values his life, but Skye knows he must be thinking something along those lines.

She really hopes she doesn't get killed or anything tomorrow. That wouldn't be a good way to show him she can do this.

(oh, fuck, she thinks, was May even right? would she do anything to impress him? would she get herself killed? even after hearing May said that Skye hadn't thought about the possibility that it might be true – she doesn't like that idea, she needs to _not die_ and prove it's not true)

 

+

 

Once she's in the Bus (once she's _home_ ) she washes the dye off her hair, first thing, before anything else, and she feels a bit more like herself. The hair too short, still, but that will sort itself out soon enough. She looks paler and thinner, though, the dark under her eyes is new too – she hopes that will sort itself out as well.

She feels like they are just repeating this scene; Skye drying her hair in her bunk and Coulson watching her do it.

"I feel like I haven't been here in _years_ ," she says, feeling the damp hair with her fingertips. It won't be long until it's at normal length; but the feeling of having been another person for a while will persist.

"It felt like that around here, too," Coulson says, unexpectedly honest.

"Thanks, sir."

She inquires about the future of her ex-colleagues. She knows the danger in what they had done but she might have been that naive once (no, she was never that naive) and many of them are just kids, curious kids like Lore, who couldn't possibly deserve the jail time their crime actually warrants. Or could they? After a couple of months with these people Skye decides she got too close to be objective. She probably shouldn't have a say in this. Not even her supervisors, people who more or less knew what the technology would be used for, looked like terrible people.

"I guess the problem with evil people is that... up close they don't feel so evil," she says.

She wonders if Coulson thinks she's thinking about Ward. She wasn't. She is now.

"Your reports were very detailed," he tells her. "I'll make sure they study each individual case. There are people in this group who don't need to pay with their whole future for being young and foolish. We'll make sure they don't."

It's a good thing that some days it seems like Coulson can read her mind; not all the time, not on many things, but some days.

"Thank you. I didn't want to be the responsible for ruining the lives of people who didn't deserve it."

"That is not what _we_ do."

She nods.

"Anyway, it's good to be home. In my own bed, yes," she's so excited about that. The motel wasn't exactly a palace.

"I'll let you rest, we can round up the report tomorrow," Coulson says, all sensible despite how much she knows he wants to finish all the paperwork.

Skye turns around, considering whether to unpack or just leave it until tomorrow, imagining Coulson will start walking away any moment now.

He doesn't.

She doesn't hear the sound of his footsteps behind her. She pauses, feeling his presence linger, suddenly very aware of it inside her room; the door is open but it could be closed for all intents and purposes. She's more aware of him right now than she was in that bathroom stall.

Then Skye feels his hand over her back, right over her still-tender scar, but not applying any pressure that might cause her discomfort. He just leaves his hand there, resting.

She freezes. For a moment it seems like Coulson is going to say something, wants to say something else, wants to do something else. She can feel his fingers moving slightly, like they are itching. She breathes deeply and his body presses against his hand and his palm fits comfortably against her spine. There's something fraught with possibility about this moment. Possibility of what Skye has no idea. Something. _Any_ thing.

Skye is about to ask what he's doing but then– 

Then it's gone. Not just the touch, not just his hand on her back, not just the _moment_. Coulson's gone. She turns around and he's already walking away, already climbing the steps to his office.

Like he was never here.


	5. i want you close (i want you)

  


  


And she had started the day in such a good mood...

She had been excited when she heard they had a mission. Even more so when she heard it was going to be her and Coulson. She was elated when she heard it'd be undercover.

But then – 

Then Coulson explained what the cover was.

 

+

 

"I'm not going to do it," she tells him, voice raised as they climb the stairs to the second floor. "Change the specs of the mission, or find somebody else. I just can't do it."

He follows her.

She wishes he wouldn't (part of her doesn't, really, but it's a really small and stupid part). She wishes he could just drop the whole thing without making her explain. But when has Coulson done something like that? She rushes up the stairs, as long as she has enough of an advantage she can pretend she doesn't hear him telling her to wait, doesn't hear Coulson saying her name.

She walks into her bunk, pretending she has a lot of stuff to do, and couldn't be bothered to continue this argument.

He follows her inside.

"Skye?"

He closes the door behind him. Her bunk is not exactly designed to have two people standing around, and that sort of thing is normally what gets her in trouble (not that he knows, of course, it's obvious he doesn't, or he would never ever ever – the jerk) and they have never been here together like this but Coulson must think this is serious enough that they need some privacy.

She hadn't imagined this day was going to turn out like this; having a fight with Coulson inside her bunk.

"I just don't think the cover is solid," she says. "Why can't we go like we did to that party? Remember? We did well, we should stick to that sort of story."

"I told you, these people are more traditional than that. It would raise suspicions."

"Then take Simmons, she's played your daughter before."

"Simmons doesn't – I thought you were dying for a chance to be on the field again."

He's right; they've had a couple of dry months, mission-wise. Not work-wise, god knows they've had plenty of that. But Skye is a bit fed up with saving the world from her little laptop screen. She wants to go out.

"I know what I said," she tells him, fumbling to find a way to explain (to lie) to him she cannot possibly go undercover as his daughter. "But I'm not going to do it. Not like this."

"Skye." He knows saying her name like that usually works, but this time she has too much to lose.

"Look, could you please not ask me about it? Can't you do me this favor? I don't want to do it, let it go."

She knows that's the wrong play. Now he just looks worried. And okay, it's not like she wants to be this completely unprofessional, and it's not like she has any hopes here, but it would be too humilliating. The mission would be too humilliating and explaining why she can't go on the mission would be just as much. 

Skye is stuck in an impossible situation.

"You can't say something like that and then tell me not to ask," Coulson says. He's right. He's not being dense, he's not being cruel – she is being difficult and unreasonable.

"I can't..." she sighs, feeling something hot and ugly crawl up from her lungs.

"What is going on, Skye? I don't understand why you are so set –"

"Because I don't want that image in your mind," she says, almost shouting, breathlessly. "Because I don't want you to _ever_ think of me as a daughter, not even if it's fake, not even on a mission."

Coulson quickly opens his mouth to say something, but then nothing comes of it. He presses his lips together tightly and stares at Skye with surprise, and with something a lot more precise than surprise.

She can tell, she can tell by the sudden look in his eyes. She knows, she knows before he starts moving towards her. They somehow meet halfway, mouth crashing against mouth, and sigh against sigh of relief. He ends up pressing her body against the wall, pinning her with his chest, and Skye wants to scream at how good that feels.

"God, Skye," he gasps, breath hot on her face because they are standing as close as two human beings possibly could. "I thought I was insane. I thought it was just me – but then..."

"Yes, yes. _Yes_."

She's in some sort of fever state – not quite believing this is happening, but jumping in head first anyway. She's going to tell him everything, she doesn't care how pathetic she might look, she is going to tell him how much she wants this. He's grabbing her hips almost painfully, like he needs her for balance.

"And then there was..."

"The Greenville party," she finishes before he can, because she knows, she _knows_. 

He lays a line of kisses up Skye's neck. Talks between moments of mouth-to-skin: "That night. I was out of my mind... I wanted – I want –"

"Yes?"

He shoves her harder against the wall. That seems to be the only answer required. And yes, two human beings can possibly be closer than before, apparently. Skye is not complaining, the painful pressure in her chest is not Coulson pushing, it's her heart crashing wildly against her ribs.

"You didn't kiss me," she points out, whining like a little child about it. "At the party. I asked, and you... didn't."

Coulson closes his eyes, weary, resting his head heavily against her cheek.

"I didn't want to fake-undercover-kiss you," he tells her in a low voice, some sort of embarrassing confession. "Because I wanted it to be real."

"In my motel room in... when I was on that mission," she says, and it almost hurts to even form the words, it hurts to remember how much she had wanted him that night. "When I was hurt and you were patching me up... Damnit, Coulson, I almost lost it. Okay? It was totally unbearable."

She runs her hands over his chest, not knowing where she wants to touch him, except everywhere all at once.

"Didn't know," he mutters, he admits. "I thought..."

Then he does something unexpected. He hooks his fingers in the waistline of her jeans and pulls Skye towards the bed, maneuvering her so that she's propped on her knees on the mattress. That actually leaves a bit more room in this too-small bunk. Skye is not sure what he has in mind but she knows what she wants, so she undoes the buttons and shoves her jeans as far down her legs as it goes.

Then she realizes what he has in mind because his hand grabs between her legs, stroking her in circles over the fabric, his fingers feeling bigger than they actually look, but then again whenever Skye has looked at those hand she has never imagined them pressed against her like this (okay, maybe she has, a couple of times, but her fantasies could never even – this is better, this is _worse_ ).

"Wow," she says, like a fucking idiot, but Coulson just smirks (he's actually _smirking_ , and it's unfair, and she is going to murder him) and tangles his other hand in Skye's hair, pulling carefully and grounding her. Even on the softness of her bed her knees hurt from trying to support her body, to support the mess she is right now. Then he slips his hand under the band of her underwear and _holy shit_ , Skye's world goes blinding white and hot and dizzy. It's too much too soon, too intimate, he must be able to feel her whole body around his middle finger, and now he knows, _he knows_ , without a doubt, how much she – Skye feels like apologizing for that. She feels like telling him to stop, not look at her, except she doesn't really want him to stop, ever, not now that she finally has him.

"Is this what you wanted me to do, in the Greenville party?" he asks, voice low and deadly, pushing a second finger into her. And fuck but who knew well-bred and proper and stick-up-his-ass SHIELD Agent Phil Coulson was a dirty talker in bed? Actually, she kind of knew.

"God, Coulson, what the hell are you–? Yes, I wanted it, so much. It was all I could think of."

She's not going to last long like this, he's unrelenting and fast, and she's not going to last and Coulson is going to think she's an idiot.

"That dress you were wearing... I could have just..." She's never heard that voice come out of him. She never _imagined_ he could speak in that kind of voice.

Skye is glad to see he seems just as affected by this as her. And she could just come from that voice but then he twists his wrist and he crooks his fingers and he holds her head tightly against his shoulder, anchoring her as she starts to tremble. She's coming, she's coming and Coulson hasn't even undone his tie, can't help it, all these months, everything pent up inside her. She muffles her sobs into the fabric of his jacket – he is still fully dressed and she's in this state and she really is pathetic, isn't she.

"Okay?" he asks afterwards, holding her so she doesn't just fall forward. She has no strength in her limbs anymore. She shivers against his palms; oh god, she thinks, she can smell herself on his hands. She chuckles, almost hysterically, into his shoulder.

"Fuck, Coulson, I –"

"Yeah?"

"I need to... touch you."

She can actually hear him swallow.

"Yes," he says, the word bloated and heavy with lust.

Skye climbs out of her bed and out of her jeans, kicking them out of the way, standing in front of Coulson in the narrow space. She slips her hands under his jacket and pulls it down his shoulder and off him. He starts undoing his tie himself but she stops him with a hand on his wrist.

"No," she tells him, grinning. "I've wanted to do _this_ for a long time."

Coulson frowns, like he's suspicious, like he can't believe her. She thinks she might have to hit him just yet. She kisses him while she pulls on the knot, and no one ever said Skye wasn't an excellent multi-tasker. She bites his lower lip at the same time her fingertips press against his sternum and that raises a long moan from Coulson and Skye thinks it's payback time, for the unholy sounds he made her utter before. A girl has some pride, after all.

He copies the movement and starts to undress her as he keeps their mouths together. She can feel how methodically he's being and how he's holding back. She gets it; she too would like to just rip everything and get on with the plan, but it's more exciting this way, and it's more _Coulson_ , being this careful and this carefully controlled. They do this for a bit.

Skye looks down at his hands, _those fingers_ , undoing the buttons on her denim shirt, it's the most surreal thing ever.

Suddenly he grabs her waist and pushes her gently against the bed, like he's decided he has no patience for them to take off one more article of clothing. Fine by Skye. She's in her bra and he still hasn't dropped his t-shirt but they'll have time for that. If that's okay with Coulson she intends to do this to him on many more occasions. When he climbs in bed with her, every part of his body touching hers, her skin starts tingling painfully. This is real, so real it's a bit scary.

She can feel his heartbeat against her breasts, even through the layers of clothing. She has the sudden, terrible fear that no, of course this is not real, and she is a fool. She looks up at him.

"What's wrong?" he asks.

She touches his face, drawing the deep lines of his forehead with her thumb. She moves her hands to his chest and tells him.

"Any moment now I think you're going to stop and tell me this can't happen."

"It's already happened," he says. "It's been happening for some time now."

Then he kisses her so hard Skye can feel herself sinking into her mattress.

He tears his mouth from hers and moves to the sensitive spot under her ear, pressing the wet and tender muscle of his tongue against the muscle of her neck, drawing a slow line down the length of it. The heat at the bottom of Skye's stomach is unbearable now.

But she doesn't forget where all this desire comes from, and for the first time she wonders if it's the same for him.

"This is not... It's not just sex, right?" Skye feels a bit stupid asking, after having had Coulson's fingers inside her, making her come. But it occurs to her that... yeah, maybe she should ask.

His mouth leaves her neck (and she feels the loss dearly, but she kind of needs to know) as he comes up to face her.

"Do you want a declaration, Skye?" he asks, wistfully and out of breath. "Because I can definitely do that."

She gives him an open smile. She doesn't need it. She doesn't need it right now. She can see it in his eyes. She runs her fingers through the short hair at the back of his neck.

"It's okay."

"And you? Is this just... about sex?" Coulson asks.

She snorts loudly. It doesn't even worry her that it must be the least sexy thing she could do right now. This man is impossible.

"Coulson, you're like the least perceptive person on Earth," she tells him.

"Skye, _please_."

She can't breathe. He said please. He _needs_ to know, he needs her to tell him. And maybe, _maybe_ it's Skye the one who is the least perceptive person on Earth. And if he wants a declaration right now, well, she can definitely try to do that. For him.

"I'm absolutely, completely, adoringly, way too much, way too what-the-hell-am-I-doing, stupidly in Not-Just-Sex with you, A.C."

He arches an eyebrow. And if she had any doubts about it the way he kisses her next it's all the proof she needs about his own stance on the issue.

"Thanks," he says.

Suddenly Skye feels too exposed by her words – she wasn't planning of letting him know so much so soon. She needs to pull back a bit.

"Yeah, yeah, you're welcome. Now lose the pants."

He rolls his eyes but he does as he is told.

He is not modest about it and Skye stares in wonder, how unfamiliar a body like his is; she can read the decades carved into it, not just the scars, the wear of age on it, but it doesn't put her off, she almost thinks about it like an advantage he has over her, the confidence, the many times he must have done this, and even though Skye can't make any claims of innocence or inexperience herself, god knows she can't, it somehow makes her feel a bit small, wondering where she fits in all this, in the map Coulson is laying bare in front of her. Maybe it should be enough that he does, that he lets her travel that landscape, that he lets her push her curious hands under his t-shirt and down his stomach and along the length of his arousal, learning to read the road signs.

His fingers grip around her right thigh, lifting her leg a bit so that Skye would wrap it around his waist; but he is making her squirm, suddenly ticklish, and she realizes just how nervous she is, because she has wanted this so much, and she has wanted this maybe too much and now she's going to mess it up, or they are going to mess it up. But then Coulson places one soothing kiss on her shoulder, pushing the strap of her bra aside to find soft skin, and it's fine, she calms down a bit, still squirming under his weight, but for all the right reasons. She moves her body against him, edging him on. _Now_ , she thinks, she's been holding back for too long, it has been exhausting, she just wants to let go, she just wants him to let go.

"Skye, wait, wait," Coulson tells her. Yeah, good luck with that, she thinks, but she stops anyway. He frowns at her and gestures between their bodies. "I don't have..."

Oh. _Oh_ , and she smiles, enjoying that look on his face very much. This time she's the one who has thought about everything.

(she wasn't thinking about this particularly; she couldn't have; she had no hopes; she's still half-waiting for him to get up and walk out of her room forever)

She stretches to reach something behind her. After some embarrassing fumbling Skye produces a packet of condoms from her drawer. Coulson looks at her like he hasn't been more impressed in his life.

"A girl's got to be ready," she says. Then it occurs to her that he might think her crass. "I wasn't assuming anything, I had them just..."

Coulson smiles. 

"Skye, you're a wonder," he teases, kissing her cheek.

"Do you want me to...?"

He shakes his head and grabs her wrist, taking the packet out of her hand and fishing inside. She watches him, fascinated at the smallness, the everyday detail of what they are doing, the way his fingers tear open the condom wrapper. Somehow it makes it more real.

"Let me," he tells her, taking care of the process.

Skye doesn't know why she finds it so hot, watching Coulson put it on, in front of her, _for her_ , but it is, this is basically already the best sex she's ever had.

When the moment comes she curls her fingers around his hair, feeling the sweat beginning to pool along his temple. When the moment comes she kisses him, swallowing the noise Coulson makes as he pushes into her for the first time, swallowing the noise until it's part of her as well. He gives her a few moments to get used to the way he feels inside her. She doesn't need it, he feels fucking amazing, she arches up and rolls her hips and makes him groan – and this other sound feels almost better than having him inside.

Almost.

 

+

 

Her bed is a mess. She doesn't care.

It's kind of impossible to accommodate two people next to each other here. She doesn't care.

Anyone could come in and see them, resting contentedly, half-naked, limbs entwined. She doesn't care.

They are face to face, on their sides, because there's no room for anything else; Skye is struggling to keep herself from grinning, just looking so closely at his eyes. He's so close it's like she is looking at a different person – someone no one has seen before. She likes that.

Her bra is digging painfully into her ribcage so she takes it off; he gives her a curious look but she quickly hides under the sheets, pressing her breasts against the nice feel of the cotton of his undershirt and the warmth of his body.

Now he's tracing the outline of the long scar on her back, his eyes darkened for a moment. Funny, because all Skye can remember of that is how badly she had wanted something like this to happen that time, while Coulson had been cleaning her wounds. Desire uncoils in her stomach again, it never went away. She wonders how long he will need before they can do this again. She hopes it's not too long.

He lets out an amused sigh.

"Okay, okay, I'll tell Simmons to help with the mission," he says. "She's got a lot better at this, anyway."

"It's okay, I can do it. I just needed to know you didn't think of me like that. And now I guess I know."

She smiles up at him, shyly. Which is weird, considering what they have just done.

"Still... I think I'll bring in Simmons anyway. I don't think we could be convincing as father and daughter," Coulson says. She laughs against his collarbone. "At least not for now. Everyone would take one look at me and just see."

Skye lifts her head, taking a good look at him, trying to check if that's true. If anyone could see it. She's pretty satisfied with what she finds there. She brings her knees up until her leg is touching him, pleasantly warm.

"Do you think the rest of the team has heard us?" she asks. "I wasn't being particularly quiet just now. And you weren't being particularly _helpful_ with that, sir."

"I don't think it matters," Coulson says in a calm voice. "I think if they've heard us they can't be too surprised, I'm sure they must have noticed it by now. I think Simmons pretty much figured it out when we had our impressive shouting match in the lab."

Skye lifts her eyebrow. "Simmons? _I_ pretty muched figured it out then."

"Did you?"

Revisionist history is fun but she can't lie to him: "I don't know. Maybe it was way before that. Or maybe after. I mean, I knew for sure when you hugged me that night. And by the time of the party I was a complete wreck about it."

"I'm sorry," he says, meaning it.

It's weird, talking about this – even in a world where _weird_ has been completely redefined by the fact that she just had sex with Phil Coulson in her bunk in the middle of the day. But it is shocking, hearing him discuss this; he who is normally so reserved, somehow it feels more of an stretch for him, talking to her about it, much more than actually acting on his feelings.

"It's okay. I just – it did hurt a bit, thinking you didn't want me," she admits.

"I thought I couldn't let you know. That I was protecting you, by never letting you know. I didn't know I was hurting you."

"Why did you do it? Because you had to be professional or...?"

He looks at her with raw, honest need, and more than just a bit of regret.

"Because it never occurred to me that you could feel the same."

Her eyes widen: "Shit, Coulson, we need to work on our communication skills."

That wins her a chuckle, and it is a good sound to hear from him.

"I think you should start calling me Phil," he tells her.

" _Phil_? No way. Too weird yet. You're going to have to give me many more orgasms before I can call you that."

"Is that a proposition?" he asks, tickling Skye under her ear with his nose. He is a tease. She kind of also knew that as well. 

"Yes, it fucking is," she tells him, bringing her lips to his once more.

But he doesn't take it as a proposition, he takes it as a _challenge_ , kissing her hard, hand dropping dangerously from Skye's hip to her thigh and his whole body pressing against her so she would know – okay, she thinks, so this is _how long_ he needs. Coulson, you're a wonder indeed. But she knew that already. She sighs happily against his mouth.

Skye hadn't imagined her day was going to turn out like this.


End file.
